Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer Awards

The Journal of Quantiative Spectroscopy & Radiative Transfer organizes several awards. The awards are named after famous contributors to the three sections of the journal: molecular spectroscopy, electromagnetic light-scattering and radiative transfer respectively.

About the award

The Benedict Spectroscopy Award is introduced in honor of William S. Benedict, widely acclaimed for his fundamental contributions delineating the mechanism of the water-vapor laser, his early work on molecular line shape, and for his discovery of hydrogen chloride in the atmosphere of the planet Venus. He was co-author of the internationally recognized Liège Solar Atlas, a listing and identification of the Earth's atmospheric spectrum. He had a seminal impact on the establishment of the HITRAN molecular spectroscopic database that is so widely used today: his monographs on the absorption lines of water vapor and carbon dioxide were actually the prototype for the HITRAN database. The Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer (JQSRT) is considered as one of the leading journals where the teachings of Benedict are extensively applied. Benedict was also one of the initial Associate Editors of JQSRT and a key player in the establishment of this journal. These Life Time Achievements awards were established in 2010 and set up “to commemorate the landmark life-time achievements of a leading authority in the field”. The awards are normally presented every two years, at a relevant conference for the subfield.

The Poynting Award is established in honor of John Henry Poynting, whose fundamental work on the direction and magnitude of electromagnetic energy flow eventually became the foundation of the radiative transport theory. The Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer is considered as one of the leading journals where the teachings of Poynting are extensively applied in virtually all subject areas as listed in the Aims and Scope of the Journal.

The Young Scientist Awards were established in 2007 to acknowledge contributions from talented young researchers under the age of 37. The JQSRT awards in the categories of Radiative Transfer and Electromagnetic Scattering are named after Raymond Viskanta and Peter C. Waterman, respectively.